Friday, August 8, 2008

Coat Muslin

I am making a winter coat for Coleen. The first step was a muslin to make sure I had the right size. I want there to be growing room, but on the other hand I don't want her to be swimming in it. My main quandry, is the length of the sleeves. They are about 3" too long. Can I just hide that in the seam allowance and resew them when they need to be longer or is it better to leave them a little long and cut the seam allowances properly? In the bottom picture she is pointing to where her shoulder actually hits. The shoulders are wide, but overall I don't think it looks gigantic on her. So what do you think?

2 comments:

Amelia - this is a beautiful jacket. It's kind of hard to tell, but I think I would take the shoulders in a little bit. I think it's OK for the shoulders to hit her just off the shoulder, but with this style sleeve, it just kind of looks too big. As for the sleeve length, I would probably make an extra deep hem on the sleeve, and then let that out as her arms get longer. Your daughter is darling, and she looks like she’ll grow taller rather than wider, so I would think more about length issues rather than width. You can tell that she loves her beautiful new coat!

The coat looks great. Is she wearing garments under it that are comparable to what she'd wear in the winter? A sweater under the coat can fill up the shoulders...For the sleeve hem, in order to keep growing room for her, I would construct a big cuff. Basically, just cut a piece identical to the sleeve, going up maybe halfway to the elbow? Then sew it on at the sleeve hem and fold back on itself. This way when you fold the sleeve up (like she is in the picture) you have no seam allowances, and how far you fold it back can change as she grows. You could put a non-functioning button on this cuff to make it look more intentional.